In Situ Data on Snow and Sea Ice in Polar Regions

Dear Colleagues,

Monitoring rapidly changing polar regions is essential to understand the impacts of climate change, protect ecosystems, and predict future environmental shifts. This monitoring helps inform policy, supports conservation efforts, and ensures the sustainability of human and wildlife populations in these sensitive regions. The lack of visibility and availability of in situ data on snow and sea ice in polar regions hinders accurate climate monitoring and modeling, making it difficult to assess environmental changes, predict future conditions, and implement effective conservation and policy measures. In situ data are crucial for understanding snow and sea ice in polar regions and provide essential ground-truthing for satellite or remote sensing-based models, helping to refine predictions related to climate change, sea ice loss, and snow cover trends. Measurement campaigns are often conducted by international research teams in the Arctic and Antarctic to collect high-resolution in situ data. These campaigns can involve icebreaker ships, research stations, and remote platforms, such as those used in UAVs, to obtain measurements that are difficult to capture using satellites alone.

Harmonization involves ensuring that in situ data from different measurement campaigns and sources can be integrated. Snow and sea ice data from various campaigns may be collected using different methods, so it is crucial to standardize how measurements are made, including uniform methods for snow depth, sea ice thickness, and surface roughness, among others.

UAVs equipped with high-resolution cameras and remote sensing tools have become invaluable for in situ data collection in polar regions. UAVs can access areas that are otherwise difficult or dangerous to reach, offering new insights into the dynamics of snow and sea ice.

This Special Issue invites and encourages submissions regarding, but not limited to, the following topics:

• Role of in situ snow and sea ice data in polar regions in terms of impacts of climate change, protecting ecosystems, predicting environmental shifts and their global implications, informing policy and supporting observation efforts in the Arctic and Antarctic;
• Use of in situ snow and sea ice data from the polar regions in climate studies such as refining satellite or remote sensing-based models and understanding snow and sea ice dynamics, trends, and climate change impacts;
• Measurement campaigns, methods and inventories of snow and sea ice in polar regions;
• Data harmonization methods and practices for consistency across various data sources for integration and comparison.

Dr. Ali Nadir Arslan
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

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• in situ data inventories
• snow
• sea ice
• UAV
• cameras
• harmonization
• measurement campaigns